Poetry and Sleep
 Poems from South Africa
Published in a South Africa in an anthology 1910
Herbert Tucker
Sunrise
FRESH from a plunge in the sequestered pool,
This bosky hollow holds as in a cup,
And freed from lingering languors of the night,
By the delicious chill of dim-lit depths,
I stand awhile upon its reedy brink,
And with an eager and awakened gaze
Watch how the cloudless morn like some fair flower
Unfolds its splendours.
Autumn's lagging sun
Still lingers to o'ertop the wooded slope
Behind me, leaving undisturbed awhile
The slumb'rous dusk of the beshadowed pool;
But half the bush-grown hill that mounts beyond
Is mellowed with a mantling garb of gold,
And o'er its rock-strewn summit's soaring ridge
Expands the sunlit azure, pale and pure.
A breath of primal freshness seems to stir
In the soft eddies of the morning air,
As if old Earth in some awaking dream
Had won again the gladness of her youth.
Borne from the bush, the wood-dove's crooning note
Hints of a hidden peace surpassing speech,
And the gay pipe and thrill of many a bird
Lends utterance to the joyance of the hour!
O, miracle of morning! ever new,
As on the first sweet dawn in Paradise;
O glad tranquillity, whose healing thrill
No other hour in weary hearts can wake!
Soft steals the golden sunlight down the slope,
As it would catch the dark pool unaware.
Bush after bush its glowing kiss receives,
And grey old thorn-trees grasp it eagerly
In their rough arms, as though its warm embrace
Might bring back verdure to each withered bough
And now the leader of the shining herd
Sets a shy foot upon the crumbling bank,
And straight the leaden water is bespread
With a swift dawn and flush of wavering light
That weaves a smile across its sullen front,
Like Hope surprising some despairing soul.
Spread, sunshine! o'er the gladdened waters spread,
Until each lurking shadow is displaced;
And take as thanks the incense offering
Of slowly drifting vapour-wreaths that smoke
From its sun-smitten surface. Come at last
Where I that sing of thee stand, and through my frame
Strike a quick ecstasy of sensuous bliss.
Strike through the flesh and reach my inmost soul,
And slay its shadows with thy glorious light!
Pure from the pool, anointed by thy beams,
And soul-fed with sweet visions of the morn.
The better shall I live and work this day,
Feeling through hours of toil remembered thrills
Of sunlight kisses, soft and warm as love's.
The Twilight Hour
NOT in the noise and glare of day:
The clamour of the crowded way:
Comes any voice to me.
'Mid the harsh world's distracting hum
My heart is dull, my lips are dumb,
No dreams my soul may see.
But when afar from street and mart,
In eve's hushed hour I walk apart,
While in the paling west
The sunset fire's last smouldering brand
Sheds a faint lustre o'er the land,
To light it to its rest;
While in the zenith’s deepening blue
Some bold-eyed star has leapt to view,
First in the field of night;
Whose brightening beacon-flame inspires
A growing host of kindred fires
Soft stealing into sight;
When all the misty vale is still,
Save for the cricket’s ceasless trill,
The chorus of the vlei,
The watch-dog’s bark, the low of kine,
And lesser sounds too faint and fine
For the coarse ear of day;
(O hallowed hour, unearthly fair!
O stainless deeps of purple air!
O silver stars on high,
Watching with all-compassionate gaze
Those who along earth’s dusky ways
Wander alone, as I!)
Then, floating down some starry beam,
A glorious thought, a golden dream,
Falls on my heart like dew;
And fancy’s sun-besmitten flowers,
That languished through the noontide hours,
Lift their sweet heads anew!
And tones of earth’s pathetic strain
Are wafted through my wakened brain;
And from the shadowy skies—
O hush! O hark! And though shalt hear,
Echoed from shining sphere to sphere,
The Eternal Harmonies!
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